Passing guard – head and hips: Whenever it's time to pass your opponents guard, the two key elements are your opponents head and hips. In most cases you will use the hips as the first goal. You will need to close distance and gain angle in order to pass the line of your opponents hips. From that position you out your opponent into a defensive framework where he must focus upon recovering his guard rather than attacking you. Then the next goal is to get control of your opponents head and shoulders in order to finalize the pass. So for most passes, it's a case of hips first, head last. A very important exception to this is half guard passing. This allows you to control the head PRIOR to passing. This is a huge advantage. It enables far greater control over an opponent and takes away the wild scrambles often associated with guard passing. If you are not the fastest or most agile player on the mat, passing from half guard may well be your best option. Moreover, half guard passing combines exceptionally well with other passing methods. When basic passing methods fail, they almost always present opportunities to drop into half guard and continue passing from there. Make sure you exploit the great power of passing from half guard as a centerpiece of your overall passing game – it works equally well gi or no gi and works for all body types and ages.
